Dr. Andrew Ibrahim, Chief Clinical Officer at Viz.ai
George D. Zuidema Professor, Michigan Medicine, Michigan Medicine Department of Surgery
Closing Rural Care Gaps with Clinically Proven AI
Rural communities face persistent gaps in healthcare access, quality, and outcomes that leave patients underserved and health indicators worse than in urban areas. Now, AI can directly address these rural care barriers.
Stroke in Rural Health
For example, stroke is a leading cause of death and long-term disability, with rural patients experiencing higher mortality and longer treatment delays. These gaps are driven by structural barriers, such as limited access to neurologists, imaging expertise, and coordinated stroke systems, not lack of clinical effort. Because stroke is profoundly time-sensitive, delays disproportionately harm rural patients, making it a clear opportunity for meaningful rural health transformation.
AI-powered care solutions address rural challenges in three ways that traditional models cannot
1
Early detection and triage at the point of care
AI can rapidly analyze imaging and clinical data to flag suspected disease and critical findings in minutes, even in hospitals without on-site specialty coverage. This accelerates diagnosis and enables faster treatment or transfer decisions.
2
Decision support for rural care teams
Rural emergency departments are often staffed by generalists managing high-acuity cases. AI tools support guideline-based decision-making by surfacing and sharing actionable insights in real time, mitigating workforce shortages without replacing clinical judgment.
3
Care coordination across fragmented systems
Critical and acute care frequently require coordination across EMS, emergency departments, imaging, specialists, and receiving centers. AI platforms like Viz.ai unify these workflows, ensuring the right teams are alerted and aligned quickly—critical in rural settings.
Viz.ai as an Example of Scalable, Guideline-Aligned Stroke AI
The Viz.ai platform is backed by more than 120 clinical studies and abstracts that show the impact on patients, care teams and hospitals. The VALIDATE multi-center analysis, including telehealth, examined 14,116 cases across 166 facilities in 17 states and found that arrival-to-neurointerventionalist notification was 39.5 minutes faster, a 44.13% reduction (p<0.001) with Viz.ai vs non-AI sites.
AI-Powered Care Included in the AHA Guidelines
AI software for stroke is recognized in American Heart Association (AHA) guidelines as a tool to support early detection, triage, and clinical decision-making in acute stroke care.
This matters for rural health policy. The inclusion of AI in AHA guidelines signals that these technologies are clinically validated, evidence-based, and appropriate for broad adoption, not pilot-only experimentation.
In rural settings, platforms like Viz.ai can enable faster identification of suspected disease, support earlier activation of care and transfer pathways, reduce time to treatment, and improve consistency of care across low-volume and resource-constrained hospitals.
Hear from Dr. Andrew Ibrahim, Chief Clinical Officer at Viz.ai, in a congressional hearing on AI in healthcare, on how AI-powered care coordination specifically helps rural communities and patients.
Faster Decisions, Better Results for Rural Communities with Proven AI
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The VALIDATE data, across 166 facilities in 17 states, show that use of the Viz platform resulted in a clinically important decrease in the time it took for large blood vessel occlusion recognition and contact with the interventional team, which in turn may translate to fewer neurons dying and, ultimately, better patient outcomes.
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Compared to a metropolitan PSC in our network, two rural PSCs had significantly higher per capita incidence of stroke activations. There was a trend toward higher per capita thrombectomy alerts as well. Given the known health disparities in rural regions of the US, these findings provide clear confirmation of the importance of stroke care protocols in rural areas, and the value of rapid identification and triage for rural communities.
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We are pleased to be able to partner with Viz.ai to bring this cutting-edge artificial intelligence technology to Ashe Memorial Hospital… Through faster and enhanced detection, our physicians are able to proactively respond, saving critical time while improving the efficiency and quality of patient care.
Resources
Three New Clinical Studies Presented at the Society of Neurointerventional Surgery Annual Meeting...
Real-world evidence demonstrates the clinical, health equity and patient benefits of AI-powered care coordination. San Francisco, CA – July 31,...
Jul 31, 2023
Jun 05, 2023